Saakashvili, backers break through into Ukraine

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Former Georgian President and former Ukraine official, Mikheil Saakashvili speaks to media as Ukrainian border officers block the Shegini check point on Ukrainian-Polish border, Ukraine, Sunday, Sept. 10, 2017.

Mikheil Saakashvili and a crowd of supporters are proceeding into Ukraine on foot after breaking through a line of guards on the Polish-Ukrainian border.

Saakashvili, a former Georgian president who later became governor of Ukraine’s Odessa region, was stripped of his citizenship in July by Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko. Saakashvili has called that move illegal and has vowed to return to contest it, although Ukraine said it would deny him entry.

He and a small group of supporters on Sunday pushed their way through a line of guards at the Medyka-Shehyni border crossing. The move came about eight hours after Saakashvili set off from Poland on a trip that included an attempt to get into Ukraine by train, but the train would not leave with him on it.